The Morning the Tent Flew into the Sky and a Gale Warning Was Issued

This spot by the shore of Lake Biwa is nice because it's free and spacious, but it's inconvenient that there's no water source, and you can't see the starry sky due to light pollution.
I'll just be glad that I could barely make out the Orion constellation tonight.

Since this camping trip is only for one night, I don't need much food (ignore anyone saying 'what do you mean, not much?'), so I made the effort to bring my cot.
Ever since I hurt my tailbone on a duo camping trip last year,I've wanted to live a life that's a bit kinder to my backside, so I brought the cot, and camping with a cot is truly the best for sleeping comfort.
It's also nice that I can shove various things under the cot, keeping the inside of the tent neat and tidy.
A woman who couldn't tidy up has learned to clean up while camping,and here is a picture of a woman who can now camp in such a tidy tent.

(Note: This was right after setting up, and the snacks haven't been opened yet. Please consider the tent shoes thrown in the middle of the cot as a stylistic accent.)
I usually sleep on the left side, but I tried the right side this time. I'm the type who worries about this layout for a while.

There is still a faint trace of snow on the summit of Mount Hiei over there.
It was freezing at night, dropping down to 1°C.
I stuck heat packs all over my body and went to sleep wearing a down jacket and down pants.
However, the tip of my nose, which was sticking out of the sleeping bag, was so cold that I woke up in the middle of the night, which is rare for me.
I shifted the heat pack on my eye mask (since the tent is white, I wear a completely light-blocking eye mask to sleep because I want to sleep in without being killed by the morning sun) a little lower, warmed my nose directly with the heat pack, and went back to sleep.
I had only ever experienced temperatures down to 3°C, so 1°C was quite tough. It might be a bit too much for someone who hates the cold like me. Did I come a week too early...? My breath was white, and I felt like crying.

That said, I woke up at 10:00 in the morning.
I was impressed with myself for being able to sleep so soundly in a tent and oversleep every single time.
However, this morning, I was woken up by the sound of the wind and the tent itself, which was lashing against me as I slept inside.
When I shifted my eye mask and earplugs, I heard the roar of the wind.
And the tent was dented significantly inward due to the gale.
Hey, what's going on?
It wasn't raining and it wasn't cold, but the wind alone seemed tremendous.
When I checked the weather forecast on my iPhone, the wind speed had suddenly increased from 0 to 5 m/s at 10:00.

I later learned that a gale warning had been issued, and the wind speed at the shore of Lake Biwa had eventually reached 15 m/s.
Because the position of the cot happened to be windward, my weight was barely keeping the tent functioning as a tent. However, there seemed to be no chance of winning against this formidable enemy that was relentlessly flipping it with intense force from the southwest.
I tried to resist by desperately supporting it with my back from the inside, but it seems the side pegs had come out.
My bicycle had finally fallen over and rolled away, and I was worried that the stove and trash I had left in the vestibule might get blown away.
And then, an intense urge to urinate.
I had no choice but to re-insert the pegs and dash to the restroom.
I simulated it in my head, steeled myself, got off the cot, grabbed the hammer, opened the tent zipper, and just as I was about to put on my shoes.
A gust of wind, WHOOSH, attacked my house.

...

I can't believe it.
Ah.
All the pegs on the southwest side of the tent came out, and just as I thought it was standing by, catching air like a hot air balloon about to take off into the sky, it ripped out all the remaining pegs with brute force, and the tent inflated and danced into the sky.
Ah.
It's flying away.

Coming to my senses, I hurriedly put on my shoes, ran after the tent, and grabbed a single guy rope that I could just barely reach.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.
Spin, spin, spin.
You've got to be kidding me, is the tent flying?
And it's spinning in the sky.
When I was in elementary school, I used to make kites and fly them on the riverbed of the Yodo River.
Yesterday, I heard that a friend's child was going to sing "Kite" at their graduation ceremony, and I didn't know it was a song by Arashi. I thought it was My Little Lover, but their song was "White Kite".
Ah, white kite. A white tent is swaying. In the sky.

...
Yikes.
I came to my senses.
Inside that tent dancing in the sky are my iPhone, my camera, and my tablet!!
And that rock-hard Guevara mug and Koji Higashino's thermos are in there too. And the cot.
What must it be like inside while it's in the air?
Ah, someone, help me.
Please save my digital devices.
Please!

Then, a couple who had been taking a walk nearby in the gale said "What!" and came running over, jumped up, grabbed one corner of the tent, and caught the rope too.
The three of us struggled in the gale, not kite flying, but tent flying—or rather, tent landing.
Let me tell you, the wind didn't stop for a second.
All three of us, with our hair blown back, brought my home down to the ground and held it down.
The boyfriend, with his hair blown into a wild side-part, shouted, "Where should we put it?!"
I replied, "Right here is fine!" and he asked, "What about the orientation?!" I answered, "We'll finish it right here as it is!!" and he said, "Got it! I'll hold it!" and pressed down firmly, while his girlfriend went around to the other side and pressed it to the ground.
I hurriedly gathered the pegs scattered everywhere and hammered them in, bang, bang, bang! It was a coordinated effort by three people who couldn't have seemed like they just met. I managed to drive in all the pegs, tied one rope to a tree and another to my bicycle, and felt relieved.
"Thank goodness!!" "Is there anything else we can help you with?" they asked, but I wanted to check the survival of my electronic devices immediately, so I replied, "Thank you so much!! I'm okay!" and we parted ways.
Then, after bowing deeply, I started walking to hurry into the tent, tripped over the rope I had set up myself, and fell spectacularly.
For some reason, I couldn't stop laughing while keeping my face pressed against the soft ground in the strong wind.
To the couple walking away, I prayed, please don't look back, please don't notice me now, please don't help me.
When I finally managed to get inside the tent, strangely enough, the cot had moved to the left, and I found the camera on the cot, the tablet on the messy sleeping bag, and the iPhone under the sleeping bag. When I touched them, turning the power on and off, all three were alive and well. Thank goodness, thank goodness. It seems they landed after flying and spinning in the sky without a scratch.
The thermos wasn't dented, and the tea hadn't spilled either.
Whew.

I have to collect everything I left in the vestibule, like the cooler bag, frying pan, and trash, near where I was sleeping earlier.
Where did the chair go?
Actually, I'm about to pee my pants.
There's one shoe dropped over there.
I have to go pick it up before it gets blown away.
I can't believe the camera survived without a scratch.
Even though it was spinning in the sky like that.
Good grief.
Ah, I have to clean up quickly and go to the bathroom.
The sheet has flown away and disappeared somewhere.
I have to find it.
It was a very busy morning.

And then.
After clearing everything up, I ate a leisurely breakfast while blocking the gale in the tent's vestibule.

The Takayama ramen I bought and brought back from my Gifu trip in Januarywas something I had been waiting patiently for the end of winter for, looking forward to eating it while camping once spring arrived.
My way of eating instant noodles is to top them with 7-Eleven's domestic green onion and savory seared chashu pork. My homemade chashu ramen gets a major upgrade.
It's delicious, so I want to recommend it to all of humanity who eats noodles.

I'm proud of myself for being able to boil water and slurp ramen as if nothing had happened.
This calmness is my strong point.
I'm so cool that I'm falling for myself.

The events from earlier felt so surreal that I couldn't tell if they had actually happened or if it was a dream.
It's hard to believe that a tent would fly into the sky right after waking up. I wanted to think it might have been a dream, but seeing the dirt on the knees of my down pants, I could be certain that I had indeed fallen spectacularly earlier.

Thinking that the only way to prevent the tent from flying away again was to prepare a weight just in case, I went back into the tent after finishing my meal and quickly went back to rolling my body around to act as a weight.

Close the left door on the windward side, open only the right one, and flip the chairs over onto the ground so they don't get blown away.
I was watching, thinking that surely the trees wouldn't fly away.

However, the wind direction was in our favor.
If it had flown toward Lake Biwa, it would have been the end of everything.
Camping by the lake has risks in places you wouldn't expect.
I never imagined this would fly away.

I learned that a freestanding tent doesn't just collapse, but can fly through the air in its original shape, spinning as it goes,
and that from now on, I need to check not just the weather and temperature, but also the wind speed.
Also, make sure to drive the pegs in firmly.
This is the basic rule of camping.
It was my fault for driving the pegs in shallow and haphazardly because the ground was too soft.
I got complacent and cut corners, and nature taught me a harsh lesson.
Camping is still a continuous learning experience.

You can find more stories about my solo camping trips in this magazine below: